Every afternoon around this time I feel depressed. I feel useless. I feel no one really cares about me. I have no idea why I'm sitting here taking up space. I feel I do nothing right. Sometimes I catalogue my list of wrongs and I cry. Other times which is worse. I feel numb and I think about dying. I don't think about taking my own life. That would be more active. I'd just think about how I'm in a lot a pain right now. Usually I can just about do something like watch tv or call C. That's about it. But nothing to actually fix the supposed reason I'm haranging myself about.

Right now I feel this post is totally boring and pointless. I feel totally pathetic telling you all this. But last night I felt good. And I promised myself I'd post this.

My depression is chemically induced like depression is, it's temporary. It's caused by the drugs I'm taking, supposedly to help my movement disorder. But there are millions of people from whom, this isn't temporary. Who feel this way every day.

And I wanted to say that as bad as my life has been sometimes, I usually don't feel like the above even when things are really bad. I feel sad. That's different from depression. When I feel sad, I still do things. I do my best to fix what's wrong. Sure, I cry, but I feel better after I cry. And right now from a relative point of view, things are actually going better.

So my post is really on the off chance, someone's reading this who's depressed and thinks it's their fault and something they can control. It's not. It's a problem with your brain chemistry. It's no more your fault than having diabetes, or some other medical condition that needs to be managed.

My depression is getting better. For couple weeks, I felt depressed all the time. I waded through life convinced that someone was going to tell me I sucked. I think today is another step towards feeling better. I managed to write this post. I hope it's coherent. And I think I may even leave it up.

You are so brave to post this - and yes, it is so valuable to realize that depression is a chemical thing. The tricky thing about depression is that you already feel so bad that it's like "of course this is my fault" - so thank you, thank you, thank you for the reminder that it is not!

I'm really sorry that this is a side effect of your meds, but thank you for using it as a way to find compassion and bring awareness.

While I agree that most of the time depression is caused by chemical imbalances, it is also true that parenting a medically complex child or having an illness yourself can lead to these moments.

Many days, at around 3 pm or so, I feel the same way. Typically, the same things (calling husband, reading, watching t.v.) help me. It seems the longest part of the day, the part when dealing with Charlotte's reflux is never-ending. The mean blues for sure.

Thank you for your courage in posting this. It helps me (and I hope you) to know that I'm not the only one going thru it.

Next time you feel like no one cares, be sure to check your LJ page and see how many of us are rooting for you and yours.